A handheld power tool designed as a cordless screwdriver, which is equipped with an electric drive motor which drives a rotatably mounted tool receptacle for receiving a tool via a multistage planet gear, is discussed in DE 10 2004 058 809 A1.
Planet gears of this type may usually be switched between two gear stages having a slow rotational speed and high torque or having a higher rotational speed and lower torque. A slide switch manually adjusts an annulus wheel in the axial direction between a latched position having a latching disk fixed in a housing and an unlatched position, the annulus gear wheel being rotationally connected to a sun wheel of the planet gear in such a way that the annulus gear wheel is also fixedly coupled with the housing in the latched position and the annulus gear wheel may rotate in the unlatched position. When adjusting between the latched and unlatched positions, the annulus gear wheel is abruptly accelerated or braked. The switching operation may not be reliably carried out under load; in this case, the operator must turn the handheld power tool off and then on again, the switching operation not being completed until a restart.